Anna Massey
Encyclopedia
Anna Raymond Massey, CBE (11 August 19373 July 2011) was an English
English people
The English are a nation and ethnic group native to England, who speak English. The English identity is of early mediaeval origin, when they were known in Old English as the Anglecynn. England is now a country of the United Kingdom, and the majority of English people in England are British Citizens...

 actress. She won a BAFTA Award
British Academy Film Awards
The British Academy Film Awards are presented in an annual award show hosted by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts . It is the British counterpart of the Oscars. As of 2008, it has taken place in the Royal Opera House, having taken over from the flagship Odeon cinema on Leicester Square...

 for the role of Edith Hope in the 1986 TV adaptation of Anita Brookner
Anita Brookner
Anita Brookner CBE is an English language novelist and art historian who was born in Herne Hill, a suburb of London.-Early life and education:...

’s novel Hotel du Lac
Hotel du Lac
Hotel du Lac is a 1984 Booker Prize winning novel by English writer Anita Brookner.-Plot:Romantic novelist Edith Hope is staying in a hotel on the shores of Lake Geneva, where her friends have advised her to retreat following an unfortunate incident...

.

Early life

Massey was born in Thakeham
Thakeham
Thakeham is a village and civil parish in the Horsham District of West Sussex, England located to the north east of Storrington.The name Thakeham means "thatched homestead" and the original village had just one main street which is home to the village's only pub, The White Lion, and church. The...

, West Sussex
West Sussex
West Sussex is a county in the south of England, bordering onto East Sussex , Hampshire and Surrey. The county of Sussex has been divided into East and West since the 12th century, and obtained separate county councils in 1888, but it remained a single ceremonial county until 1974 and the coming...

, England, the daughter of British actress Adrianne Allen
Adrianne Allen
Adrianne Allen was an English stage actress.Most often seen in light comedy, played Sybil Chase in the original West End production of Private Lives and Elizabeth Bennet in the 1935 Broadway production of Pride and Prejudice.She appeared in several films and was the mother of Daniel and Anna...

 and Canadian-born Hollywood actor Raymond Massey
Raymond Massey
Raymond Hart Massey was a Canadian/American actor.-Early life:Massey was born in Toronto, Ontario, the son of Anna , who was born in Illinois, and Chester Daniel Massey, the wealthy owner of the Massey-Ferguson Tractor Company. Massey's family could trace their ancestry back to the American...

. Her brother, Daniel Massey
Daniel Massey (actor)
Daniel Raymond Massey was an English actor and performer. He is possibly best known for his starring role in the British TV drama The Roads to Freedom, as Daniel, alongside Michael Bryant...

, was also an actor. She was the niece of Vincent Massey
Vincent Massey
Charles Vincent Massey was a Canadian lawyer and diplomat who served as Governor General of Canada, the 18th since Canadian Confederation....

, a Governor General of Canada
Governor General of Canada
The Governor General of Canada is the federal viceregal representative of the Canadian monarch, Queen Elizabeth II...

, and her godfather was film director John Ford
John Ford
John Ford was an American film director. He was famous for both his westerns such as Stagecoach, The Searchers, and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, and adaptations of such classic 20th-century American novels as The Grapes of Wrath...

.

Career

Though she had no formal training at either drama school or in repertory, in May 1955 at the age of 17 Anna Massey made her first appearance on stage at the Theatre Royal, Brighton
Brighton
Brighton is the major part of the city of Brighton and Hove in East Sussex, England on the south coast of Great Britain...

, as Jane in The Reluctant Debutante
The Reluctant Debutante
The Reluctant Debutante is a 1958 comedy film directed by Vincente Minnelli and produced by Pandro S. Berman from a screenplay by Julius J. Epstein and William Douglas-Home based on Douglas-Home's play of the same name...

, subsequently making her first London appearance in the same play at the Cambridge Theatre
Cambridge Theatre
The Cambridge Theatre is a West End theatre, on a corner site in Earlham Street facing Seven Dials, in the London Borough of Camden, built in 1929-30. It was designed by Wimperis, Simpson and Guthrie; interior partly by Serge Chermayeff, with interior bronze friezes by sculptor Anthony Gibbons...

 in May 1955 "and was suddenly famous
She then left the cast in London to repeat her performance in New York in October 1956.

She made her cinema debut in 1958 in the Scotland Yard film Gideon's Day
Gideon's Day
Gideon's Day is the first in a series of police procedural novels by John Creasey writing as J.J. Marric. Published in 1955, it features a day in the professional life of Detective Superintendent George Gideon of the C.I.D., Scotland Yard. In later books in the series, Gideon has been promoted to...

, as Sally, daughter of Jack Hawkins
Jack Hawkins
Colonel John Edward "Jack" Hawkins CBE was an English actor of the 1950s, 1960s and early 1970s.-Career:Hawkins was born at Lyndhurst Road, Wood Green, Middlesex, the son of master builder Thomas George Hawkins and his wife, Phoebe née Goodman. The youngest of four children in a close-knit family,...

's detective inspector. The director was her godfather John Ford
John Ford
John Ford was an American film director. He was famous for both his westerns such as Stagecoach, The Searchers, and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, and adaptations of such classic 20th-century American novels as The Grapes of Wrath...

.

In 1960, she played a potential murder victim in Michael Powell
Michael Powell (director)
Michael Latham Powell was a renowned English film director, celebrated for his partnership with Emeric Pressburger...

's cult thriller Peeping Tom
Peeping Tom (film)
Peeping Tom is a 1960 British psychological thriller directed by Michael Powell and written by the World War II cryptographer and polymath Leo Marks. The title derives from the slang expression 'peeping Tom' describing a voyeur...

; she then appeared in Otto Preminger
Otto Preminger
Otto Ludwig Preminger was an Austro–Hungarian-American theatre and film director.After moving from the theatre to Hollywood, he directed over 35 feature films in a five-decade career. He rose to prominence for stylish film noir mysteries such as Laura and Fallen Angel...

's Bunny Lake Is Missing
Bunny Lake Is Missing
Bunny Lake Is Missing is a 1965 British psychological thriller film directed and produced by Otto Preminger, who filmed it in black and white widescreen format in London. It was based on the novel of the same name by Merriam Modell. The score is by Paul Glass and the opening theme is often heard as...

 (1965) opposite Laurence Olivier
Laurence Olivier
Laurence Kerr Olivier, Baron Olivier, OM was an English actor, director, and producer. He was one of the most famous and revered actors of the 20th century. He married three times, to fellow actors Jill Esmond, Vivien Leigh, and Joan Plowright...

 and later played the role of the cockney
Cockney
The term Cockney has both geographical and linguistic associations. Geographically and culturally, it often refers to working class Londoners, particularly those in the East End...

 barmaid Babs in Alfred Hitchcock
Alfred Hitchcock
Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock, KBE was a British film director and producer. He pioneered many techniques in the suspense and psychological thriller genres. After a successful career in British cinema in both silent films and early talkies, Hitchcock moved to Hollywood...

's Frenzy
Frenzy
Frenzy is a 1972 British thriller film produced and directed by Alfred Hitchcock, and is the penultimate feature film of his extensive career. The film is based upon the novel Goodbye Piccadilly, Farewell Leicester Square by Arthur La Bern, and was adapted for the screen by Anthony Shaffer. La Bern...

 (1972). In the extras for the dvd release of Frenzy, Massey states that she originally auditioned for the part of the secretary Monica, a part which was eventually played by Jean Marsh. Massey appeared with her brother Daniel playing deadly siblings in the 1973 horror film The Vault of Horror
The Vault of Horror (film)
The Vault of Horror is a British portmanteau horror film made in 1973 by Amicus Productions. Like its predecessor, Tales from the Crypt, it is based on stories from the EC Comics series written by Al Feldstein and Bill Gaines...

.

Massey continued to make occasional film and stage appearances, but worked more frequently in television, making her first small screen appearance as Jacqueline in Green of the Year in October 1955 and in dramas such as The Pallisers
The Pallisers
The Pallisers is a 1974 BBC television adaptation of Anthony Trollope's Palliser novels.-Cast :*Anthony Ainley: Rev. Emilius*Terence Alexander: Lord George*Anthony Andrews: Lord Silverbridge*Sarah Badel: Lizzie Eustace...

  (1974), the 1978 adaptation of Rebecca
Rebecca (novel)
Rebecca is a novel by Daphne du Maurier. When Rebecca was published in 1938, du Maurier became – to her great surprise – one of the most popular authors of the day. Rebecca is considered to be one of her best works...

 (in which she starred with her ex-husband, Jeremy Brett
Jeremy Brett
Jeremy Brett , born Peter Jeremy William Huggins, was an English actor, most famous for his portrayal of Sherlock Holmes in four Granada TV series.-Early life:...

), The Mayor of Casterbridge
The Mayor of Casterbridge
The Mayor of Casterbridge , subtitled "The Life and Death of a Man of Character", is a tragic novel by British author Thomas Hardy. It is set in the fictional town of Casterbridge . The book is one of Hardy's Wessex novels, all set in a fictional rustic England...

 (1978), The Cherry Orchard
The Cherry Orchard
The Cherry Orchard is Russian playwright Anton Chekhov's last play. It premiered at the Moscow Art Theatre 17 January 1904 in a production directed by Constantin Stanislavski. Chekhov intended this play as a comedy and it does contain some elements of farce; however, Stanislavski insisted on...

 (1980), and Anna Karenina
Anna Karenina (1985 film)
Anna Karenina is a United States 1985 made-for-TV movie version of the famous Leo Tolstoy novel, Anna Karenina.-Plot:Tragic Anna Karenina leaves her cold husband for the dashing Count Vronsky in 19th-century Russia...

 (1985). She had roles in the British comedy series The Darling Buds of May
The Darling Buds of May
The Darling Buds of May is a British comedy drama which was first broadcast between 1991 and 1993 produced by Yorkshire Television for the ITV Network. It is set in an idyllic rural 1950s Kent, among a large, boisterous family. The three series were based on the novels by H. E. Bates. Originally...

 (1991) and The Robinsons
The Robinsons
The Robinsons is a British comedy television series that debuted on BBC Two on May 5, 2005. The show's central character is a divorced reinsurance actuary, Ed Robinson , who realises that reinsurance is not his passion and decides to rethink his life. The series is written and directed by Mark...

 (2005). She also appeared in a number of mysteries and thrillers on television, including episodes of Inspector Morse
Inspector Morse (TV series)
Inspector Morse is a detective drama based on Colin Dexter's series of Chief Inspector Morse novels. The series starred John Thaw as Chief Inspector Morse and Kevin Whately as Sergeant Lewis. Dexter makes a cameo appearance in all but three of the episodes....

, The Inspector Alleyn Mysteries
The Inspector Alleyn Mysteries
The Inspector Alleyn Mysteries is a British detective television series adapted from nine of the Roderick Alleyn novels by Ngaio Marsh. It originally aired between 1990 and 1994.In the pilot episode Detective Inspector Alleyn was played by Simon Williams...

, Midsomer Murders
Midsomer Murders
Midsomer Murders is a British television detective drama that has aired on ITV since 1997. The show is based on the books by Caroline Graham, as originally adapted by Anthony Horowitz. The lead character is DCI Tom Barnaby who works for Causton CID. When Nettles left the show in 2011 he was...

, Strange, Lewis, and Agatha Christie's Poirot
Agatha Christie's Poirot
Agatha Christie's Poirot is a British television drama that has aired on ITV since 1989. It stars David Suchet as Agatha Christie's fictional detective Hercule Poirot. It was originally made by LWT and is now made by ITV Studios...

.

With Imelda Staunton
Imelda Staunton
Imelda Mary Philomena Bernadette Staunton, OBE is an English actress. She is perhaps best known for her performances in the British comedy television series Up the Garden Path, the Harry Potter film series and Vera Drake...

, she co-devised and starred as Josephine Daunt in Daunt and Dervish on BBC radio. She was the narrator of This Sceptred Isle
This Sceptred Isle
This Sceptred Isle is a BBC radio series about the history of the lands and peoples of the British Isles. It was produced by Pete Atkin and broadcast in 1995 twice each day --- in the morning and late at night --- on Radio 4...

 on BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...

, a history of Britain from Roman times which ran for more than 300 fifteen-minute episodes. In 2009 she also appeared in a new radio version of The Killing of Sister George
The Killing of Sister George
The Killing of Sister George is a 1964 play by Frank Marcus that was adapted as a 1968 film directed by Robert Aldrich.- Stage version :Sister George is a beloved character in the popular radio series Applehurst, a nurse who ministers to the medical needs and personal problems of the local villagers...

.

In 1986, Massey was awarded the British Academy TV Award for Best Actress for her role in Hotel du Lac
Hotel du Lac
Hotel du Lac is a 1984 Booker Prize winning novel by English writer Anita Brookner.-Plot:Romantic novelist Edith Hope is staying in a hotel on the shores of Lake Geneva, where her friends have advised her to retreat following an unfortunate incident...

. She also appeared as Mrs. D'Urberville in the 2008 BBC adaptation of Tess of the D'Urbervilles
Tess of the D'Urbervilles (TV serial)
Tess of the D'Urbervilles is a 4-hour BBC television adaptation of Thomas Hardy's book of the same name. The script is by David Nicholls. It tells the story of Tess Durbeyfield, a low-born country girl whose family find they have noble connections....

, an older version of May and as Rosie in An Angel For May, and in the 2004 BBC version of Our Mutual Friend.

Acting Style

Although Massey's parts were varied, her 'cut-glass English accent, conveyed a cold and repressed character on screen'. On the stage, a number of her performances were said to be characterised by 'stillness', such as the National Theatre's production of Harold Pinter
Harold Pinter
Harold Pinter, CH, CBE was a Nobel Prize–winning English playwright and screenwriter. One of the most influential modern British dramatists, his writing career spanned more than 50 years. His best-known plays include The Birthday Party , The Homecoming , and Betrayal , each of which he adapted to...

's A Kind of Alaska
A Kind of Alaska
A Kind of Alaska is a one-act play written in 1982 by Harold Pinter , the 2005 Nobel Laureate in Literature.-Summary:A middle-aged woman named Deborah, who has been in a comatose state for thirty years as a result of contracting sleeping sickness, awakes with a mind still that of a sixteen-year-old...

.

Personal life

In the New Year's Honours List published 31 December 2004 she was created a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE)
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...

 for services to drama
Drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" , which is derived from "to do","to act" . The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a...

.

She published an autobiography in 2006, Telling Some Tales, which revealed a difficult early life and her failed marriage to actor Jeremy Brett
Jeremy Brett
Jeremy Brett , born Peter Jeremy William Huggins, was an English actor, most famous for his portrayal of Sherlock Holmes in four Granada TV series.-Early life:...

 (who struggled with bipolar disorder), their son, writer David Raymond William Huggins (b. 1959), her successful second marriage in 1988 to Russian scientist Uri Andres and of being a grandmother. Massey was quoted as saying, "Theatre eats up too much of your family life. I have a grandson and a husband and I'd rather I was able to be a granny and a wife."

Death

Massey died from cancer on 3 July 2011, aged 73. She is survived by her son, grandson and second husband.

Filmography

Year Film Role Notes
1958 Gideon's Day
Gideon's Day
Gideon's Day is the first in a series of police procedural novels by John Creasey writing as J.J. Marric. Published in 1955, it features a day in the professional life of Detective Superintendent George Gideon of the C.I.D., Scotland Yard. In later books in the series, Gideon has been promoted to...

Sally Gideon
1960 Peeping Tom
Peeping Tom (film)
Peeping Tom is a 1960 British psychological thriller directed by Michael Powell and written by the World War II cryptographer and polymath Leo Marks. The title derives from the slang expression 'peeping Tom' describing a voyeur...

Helen
1965 Bunny Lake Is Missing
Bunny Lake Is Missing
Bunny Lake Is Missing is a 1965 British psychological thriller film directed and produced by Otto Preminger, who filmed it in black and white widescreen format in London. It was based on the novel of the same name by Merriam Modell. The score is by Paul Glass and the opening theme is often heard as...

Elvira Smollett
1972 Frenzy
Frenzy
Frenzy is a 1972 British thriller film produced and directed by Alfred Hitchcock, and is the penultimate feature film of his extensive career. The film is based upon the novel Goodbye Piccadilly, Farewell Leicester Square by Arthur La Bern, and was adapted for the screen by Anthony Shaffer. La Bern...

Babs Milligan
1973 The Vault of Horror
The Vault of Horror (film)
The Vault of Horror is a British portmanteau horror film made in 1973 by Amicus Productions. Like its predecessor, Tales from the Crypt, it is based on stories from the EC Comics series written by Al Feldstein and Bill Gaines...

Donna Rogers
1978 The Mayor of Casterbridge Lucetta Templeman
1979 Rebecca
Rebecca
Rebecca a biblical matriarch from the Book of Genesis and a common first name. In this book Rebecca was said to be a beautiful girl. As a name it is often shortened to Becky, Becki or Becca; see Rebecca ....

Mrs. Danvers TV movie
1983 Mansfield Park (1983 TV serial)
Mansfield Park (1983 TV serial)
Mansfield Park is a 1983 British television drama serial, made by the BBC, and adapted from Jane Austen's novel of the same name, originally published in 1814. The serial was the first screen adaptation of the novel...

Mrs. Norris TV series
1986 Hotel du Lac
Hotel du Lac
Hotel du Lac is a 1984 Booker Prize winning novel by English writer Anita Brookner.-Plot:Romantic novelist Edith Hope is staying in a hotel on the shores of Lake Geneva, where her friends have advised her to retreat following an unfortunate incident...

Edith Hope BAFTA award-winning role
1986 Foreign Body
Foreign Body (film)
Foreign Body is a 1986 British romantic comedy film directed by Ronald Neame. It stars Victor Banerjee, Warren Mitchell, Denis Quilley, and Amanda Donohoe...

Miss Furze
1991 Impromptu George Sand's mother
1992 Inspector Morse
Inspector Morse
Inspector Morse is a fictional character in the eponymous series of detective novels by British author Colin Dexter, as well as the 33-episode 1987–2000 television adaptation of the same name, in which the character was portrayed by John Thaw. Morse is a senior CID officer with the Thames Valley...

Lady Emily Balcombe TV series, 'Happy Families'
1997 Deja Vu
Déjà Vu (1997 film)
Déjà Vu is a 1997 American dramatic romance film directed by Henry Jaglom. It stars the British actors, Stephen Dillane and Vanessa Redgrave. It premiered at the American Film Institute Festival on 25 October 1997 and was released theatrically on 22 April 1998.-Plot:Dana , a young American woman,...

2002 The Importance of Being Earnest
The Importance of Being Earnest (2002 film)
The Importance of Being Earnest is a 2002 British-American romantic comedy-drama film directed by Oliver Parker, based on Oscar Wilde's classic comedy of manners play of the same name. The original music score is composed by Charlie Mole...

Miss Prism
Possession Lady Bailey
2004 The Machinist
The Machinist
The Machinist is a 2004 English-language Spanish psychological thriller film directed by Brad Anderson and written by Scott Kosar....

He Knew He Was Right
He Knew He Was Right
He Knew He Was Right is an 1869 novel written by Anthony Trollope which describes the failure of a marriage caused by the unreasonable jealousy of a husband exacerbated by the stubbornness of a willful wife. As is common with Trollope's works, there are also several substantial subplots. Trollope...

Miss Stanbury TV Movie
Belonging
2005 Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont
Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont
Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont is a 2005 comedy-drama film made by Claremont Films and distributed by Picture Entertainment Corporation. It was directed by Dan Ireland and produced by Lee Caplin, Carl Colpaert and Zachary Matz from a screenplay by Ruth Sacks, based on the novel by Elizabeth...

Mrs Arbuthnot
2006 The Gigolos
The Gigolos
The Gigolos is a 2006 British comedy film directed by Richard Bracewell, starring Sacha Tarter and Trevor Sather alongside Susannah York, Anna Massey and Siân Phillips...

Edwina
2007 Fairy Stories by The Brothers Grimm Narrator Audiobook
Doctor Who - The Girl Who Never Was
The Girl Who Never Was
The Girl Who Never Was is a Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It takes place in Singapore in 1942 & 2008.-Plot:After the loss of C'rizz, Charley demands to be taken home...

Miss Pollard 8th Doctor audiobook
2008 Tess of the D'Urbervilles
Tess of the D'Urbervilles (TV serial)
Tess of the D'Urbervilles is a 4-hour BBC television adaptation of Thomas Hardy's book of the same name. The script is by David Nicholls. It tells the story of Tess Durbeyfield, a low-born country girl whose family find they have noble connections....

Mrs D'Urberville
The Oxford Murders
The Oxford Murders
The Oxford Murders may refer to:*The Oxford Murders , novel by the Argentine author Guillermo Martínez*The Oxford Murders , 2008 thriller film adapted from Guillermo Martínez's novel, directed by Álex de la Iglesia...

 (Film)
Mrs. Julia Eagleton
Affinity (film)
Affinity (film)
Affinity is a 2008 UK film adaptation of Sarah Waters' 1999 novel Affinity; directed by Tim Fywell and screenplay by Andrew Davies.-Plot:...

Miss Haxby TV movie

External links

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